Statistical Study on the Growth of Chlorella pyrenoidosa Using the Response Surface Methodology

Background: Recent energy scenario shows that there must be a scarcity of fossil fuel occurs in future decades, simultaneously the usage of fossil fuels encountered in environmental hazards. Therefore, alternate sources are in demand to harvest fuel. This could be availed by an alga in forth coming years by exploiting the establishment towards biofuel production. Among the numerous alga species, Chlorella pyrenoidosa is identified as a potential strain for fuel production. This work is proposed to enhance the growth and fatty acid content of Chlorella pyrenoidosa in a batch culture system for biodiesel production. Objective: The growth response of Chlorella pyrenoidosa attained by varying the major factors which includes sodium bicarbonate, cultivation time and inoculum concentration by using a Central Composite Rotatable Design -Response Surface Methodology (CCRD-RSM). Method: A design-expert 9 tool was used to optimize dependent variables and to identify the independent response for the process. Moreover, the functioning parameters have been optimized in a batch culture system using five level points of CCRD – RSM. Results: A high lipid content of 193.9 mg/L was obtained in 22nd day of culture has been grown at 8 % of seed culture and 6671 mg/L of sodium bicarbonate concentration, which evidently illustrates that the aforesaid factors are the optimal range of operating conditions which need to be considered in a high content of lipid. Furthermore, Gas Chromatographic analysis of lipids extracted from the biomass has shown a high yield of saturated and unsaturated methyl ester fatty acids such as 61.54 % of palmitic acid, 20.95 % of stearic acid and 17.51% of arachidic acid, respectively. Conclusion: Henceforth, this study affirms that the Chlorella pyrenoidosa touts green algae for biofuel production.